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Friday, February 15, 2013

Weekly Update, February 15

Reflections on this week…

I spent my Friday morning (after fighting the oppressive traffic on all
freeways) at the University of Houston in a discussion on teaching and
learning. I haven’t spent much time on campus since I graduated in December of
2004, and I found it a peaceful switch from the hour-plus I had spent in
traffic. The key theme of the discussion this morning centered on the idea of
disruption, but not in the sense you might think. It was about disruption in a
positive sense…disruption to make change and improvement.

Once I redefined disruption in my head, I started to reflect on what it
meant to my own life. I was probably feeling a little nostalgic sitting at UH,
I’ll admit it, but I started thinking about what my dreams had been when I walked
across that campus over eight years ago. I am definitely nowhere that I
pictured myself. That doesn’t disappoint me, though, which is what really
helped me to see how disruptions can become great things in our lives. I think
it is more what we make of these disruptions, how we respond to them, that
shapes our paths.

Anyway, I’m taking that idea into my weekend. When my son causes a
disruption to my sleep at 6:00 tomorrow morning, I’m going to see what I can
make of that. It will probably just be coffee, but we’ll see.

Upcoming professional
development opportunities and district meetings…

This was not an especially riveting read, but it did give some
interesting ideas for apps that might be used when addressing certain literacy
skills. The bulk of the article talks about a study that looked at the use of
iPads to teach certain skills within a fourth grade classroom.

Put Thinking to the Test

by: Conrad, Matthews, Zimmerman, Allen, & Keene

Many of you probably know about this book. Thank you to Mary-Catherine
for the awesome recommendation, because I am loving the thinking behind this
book. It is all about approaching testing as an additional genre to be studied.
While we give kids so much time to consume various types of text, they really
don’t get a lot of time to consume tests outside the actually testing time. The
authors of this book look at approaching the testing genre. Good stuff!